Dreamer
by things.fall.apart
Summary: After NM-  Jewel she says. Yeah, she is a jewel, a gem in my life I don't want to get rid of. But I can't say anything. All I can do is look at her beautiful face, and wonder why now, why her?    -Rated M for the good stuff, eventually. R&R please
1. Chapter 1

_Dreamer_

Prologue

I was having the dream again. I could feel myself in a perpetual state of movement; walking, running, dragging my feet along the damp highways. Horns honked at me—whether in praise or frustration, I was never sure—as I continued my endless trek. I had been dreaming of the journey for five nights now. I had no idea where I was headed to; I just knew that I needed to get there soon.

Something dangerous was coming, and I shuddered to think of the consequences if I didn't get there in time to heed my warning. Onward and onward on I went along the highway until my legs, heavy with exhaustion from my journey, took me down a battered road with small houses scattered on either side. Finally, I stumbled to the right, and made my way up the porch of one of the miniature homes. I knocked on the door, mentally wondering where I was.

"May I help you," echoed the voice of man who sounded to be middle-aged.

"Please," I murmured to the stranger, "danger comes."

I had the feeling my dream was coming to an end, as all went black, and I felt myself being pulled into the realm of the conscious.

One

**Julie**

The first thing I felt was an incessant twinge in the lower-left side of my back. Odd, I thought, I've never had back pains before. My mattress is supposed to have great back support. The second occurrence to my senses, clumsy and still dulled from sleep, was play of light on the outside of my eyelids. It was light out; I always got up before the sun.

Something was wrong.

I was almost afraid to open my eyes at that point. I tried to remember what I had been doing for the past week and struggled to come up with a solid answer. I only remembered the dreams I'd been having of late. As fear began to settle over me, I made the decision to keep my eyes clenched shut, and thrust my body out in my customary morning stretch.

"Billy," a woman's voice called, "She's moving again. I think she's starting to wake up."

There was a shuffling sound; I could hear water dripping back into a basin, and a cool, damp cloth soon adorned my forehead. A few seconds later, I heard wheels being rolled over hardwood, and soon the man whom I presumed to be Billy spoke.

"She has terrible timing. Jake just called and told me he's tired of staying with Sam's. He's on his way home, dead-set to see why he's been banned from his own home, as he put it."

Something was wrong; this time I was sure of it.

I wasn't in my home, I realized. My bed never gave me back pains, and as I took in a deep breath, I didn't smell the mix of lavender and vanilla candles that surround the perimeter of my room; the blanket covering me was a thick woolly one, not the soft down comforter from my bed. My silent in-take of foreign happenings was coating panic over the fear I'd felt earlier The madness continued as I noticed the familiarity of the voice of the man named Billy; I remember hearing that exact same voice in my dream just before waking up.

"Hello," Billy's voice called to me softly, "I can tell from your movements that you are awake. You can open your eyes now, and I will do my best to explain your situation."

It was time to look at the odd place I'd been thrust into. I took a deep breath and, with an apprehension uncharacteristic of my personality, opened my eyes.

Four eyes stared back into mine, both sets a deep brown, suitable to their russet-colored faces. They gave me my time as I slowly sat up in the lumpy bed, feeling the washcloth fall to the sheets. No wonder my back had a crick in it, this bed was a small single, suitable for a child, not a growing teen like myself. Additions to the tiny, empty room were sparse. There was the uncomfortable bed, a desk, and some posters of scantily-clad women posing suggestively over cars and motorcycles. I was clearly in a teenaged boy's room. Did it belong to the Jake-guy they had mentioned earlier? I avoided their expectant stares as I continued to ponder the place I was in. I knew that this was not my home—that I was in some strange place with strange people; yet the paranoia I had experienced when this thought first donned on me was beginning to subside. My family always told me I had a knack for reading people, and I knew that the man and woman beside me meant to do me no harm.

Finally, I turned my attention back to the two sets of eyes I'd first woken up to. "Okay," I breathed, "I'll start off with the obvious: Who are you and where am I?"

The man extended his hand and said calmly, "My name is Billy Black, and you're in my house. This is my old friend Sue. She's been taking care of you for the past few days."

I took his hand and shook it firmly. My father had always told me a firm handshake reflected a strong persona. "A few days," I said, stunned, "How long have I been asleep for?"

"You've woken up a few times while Sue tended to you," Billy responded, "but it was clear you were not conscious of doing so at all. I saw you three days ago as you walked up to my doorstep and fell onto my lap in a deep sleep. You haven't fully woken up since then."

The dream, the endless walking…there's no way that I really did all of that, or did I? I had always had elaborate dreams that spanned more than one night for as long as I could remember, and my parents have told me of my humorous stints of sleepwalking. Though it had been years since I'd walked in my sleep, and even longer since I'd left my house whilst doing so. Is it possible that I walked in a trance from my house to Billy's? And if I did, just how far away from my home could I be?

"Um," I started out cautiously," Where is your house at? Like, what city do you live in?"

From the look that Billy and Sue exchanged, I had a feeling that they were starting to understand why I'd asked. "Well," Sue told me, "We live on the La Push reservation near Forks, Washington."

"No way," the words slipped out of my mouth as I'd thought about the excursion I'd just undertaken, "She was right, but she can't be right, and there's just no way," the words tumbled out but I was far from aware of what I was saying, as I thought about what I had just done.

"Why don't I give you some time to think about things," Billy suggested, "sort out what it is that happened, and such? I have some errands to run, and I'm sure Sue's family is eager to see her home. I'll be back in a couple of hours, okay?"

I nodded, still wrapped up in the impossible events that led me here. I sat up and vaguely heard Sue and Billy leave.

The silence enveloped me life a comforting arm as I continued to think about it all.

The La Push reservation was home to the Quileute Indians. My gran, a sweet old lady, Quileute, had grown up on the reservation. When she was eighteen, the council had told her she held the gift of a spirit lady, one whose dreams were prophecies brought to her by spirits of her ancestors. It was an honorable position; it was a position that would give her seat on the council, no less. It would mean she would stay on the reservation for years to come; it was something she didn't want. When she was eighteen, my gran left the reservation and never came back. She made a comfortable life for herself as an elementary school teacher in northern California. It was there that she met Grandpa, and had her only son, my father.

I was gran's only grandchild, and my family was very close to her. She watched me as I grew up while my parents worked tirelessly as family lawyers, and I was told frequently that I resembled her in many ways. She always told me my dreams would take me places, just like her dream to leave La Push led her to Grandpa .Although my father is half-Quileute, and I am one quarter, we were never close to our heritage. Because Gran was so keen on leaving it all behind her, my father was taught that old Quileute practices, such as the use of a spirit lady, was all just a load of fairy tales, and I was taught to believe the same thing. But that didn't stop Gran from spouting off with the occasional premonition. She frequently told me she dreamt of me, "going places," but I didn't think that meant going from Del Norte, California to Forks, Washington.

As I look back on mine and Gran's similarities, I wondered if I have her gift, the gift that she tried so hard to run away from. I still sense an impending danger around this area, not unlike the one I had felt in my dream.

If I had been walking for as long as I'd been dreaming of my travels, then, including the time that I was sleeping in Billy's house, I'd been gone for eight days. I was supposed to leave with my mom on a week-long mother-daughter bonding trip six days ago—I'd had my bag packed and everything. Wondering if I would have thought to bring anything before leaving, I started to look around the room. There it was, resting against one of legs of the desk. Not the bag I'd packed for my trip with Mom, but a different one. It was a sports bag I usually used when I spent the night at a friend's house or to cart around my yoga gear.

Because the room was so small, I merely needed to lean a little and fully extend my arm to grab my bag. Inside was the wad of cash I usually kept in the bottom of my dresser, totaling about eight hundred dollars; there was also a bottle of water, a set of pajamas and a spare change of clothes, spare underwear and socks, and an envelope with my name on it.

I was about to reach in and grab the envelope when I heard a clamor coming from outside the room I was currently laying in.

"I don't know why you wanted me to stay at Sam's, but you know three days is my limit over there," A voice called. I could tell it belonged to a young man, and I figured it was that Jacob I heard Billy mention; I could only presume the boy is Billy's son, the one whose room I lay in. I could hear as his footsteps brought him closer to where I lay. I didn't know what do. I thought it was odd that Billy kept him away in the first place, but I knew there was nothing I could do. If the boy wanted to go in his room, there was nothing I could do to stop him. Noticing a mirror resting on the desk, I quickly got up and took a look at myself.

It looks as if the Sue woman had been able to get me up for a shower, seeing as my face was clean and my hair was hanging in the curls I get when my hair dries naturally. I looked down and noticed I was wearing my yoga pants, my pink sports bra, and a tank top. I knew I wasn't wearing this the last time I remember going to bed, which means Sue found my bag and must have changed my clothes.

The approaching footsteps, which I knew had previously been wandering through the house, approached the door to the room, and stopped suddenly, just short of the door frame. Slowly, I turned around, and looked directly into a beautiful russet face. As the familiarity of the boy's face dawned on me, I let out a small gasp.

"Who the hell are you?"


	2. Chapter 2

Two

I'd dreamt about him just before I left. I struggled to remember what the dream had been about, but couldn't remember a thing aside from his looks. He was tall, well over six feet, and had short black hair. His muscles were astounding and as I sat at his desk, taking in his beautiful form, I had the strongest urge to reach out and stroke his wondrous russet skin.

"Well," he demanded, "Are you going to tell me who the hell you are and why you're in my room."

"Jewel," I murmured, still staring at his face, "Are you Jacob?"

"Yeah, now are you gonna tell me why you're here?"

I felt that he was trustworthy and, hoping to really make sense of all of this anyway, told him what I'd figured out so far. "I'm not sure. To warn you and everyone else around you, I think, about something very dangerous. I walked for five days to tell you something, and I don't remember doing any of it."

Jacob sat down on his bed, never saying a word, and began to stare at me. I sat unwavering as he did so, wondering what he was looking for as he continued to gaze so intently. I wondered if he found me attractive. Many people told me I had a natural type of beauty that some girls kill for. My skin was slightly darkened from my Quileute origins, and never looked tired or blemished; I was slender with nice curves for my age, and my hair fell in dark waves halfway down my back. As I thought about his beauty compared to mine, I felt he held an upper hand. He exerted power while I exerted calm quietness, sort of unnatural and eerie for a teenager.

Jacob's stare began to change as a thought clearly dawned on him, though what was going through his head at the moment, I couldn't ascertain. The look was somewhere between happiness and astonishment, and it was starting to make me feel uncomfortable. I was in a place I'd never thought I would ever see, and with people I hardly knew. For a moment, I needed to forget. I needed to talk of something, anything, other than my curious predicament. Trying to ignore his odd expression, I decided that maybe we could strike up some resemblance of a normal conversation, and for a while, maybe I could be distracted. "What were you doing," I asked timidly, "while you staying at your friend's house?"

His face seemed to go blank as he replied, "I was ah, trying to distract myself. I went on runs; very long runs."

"Girl problems," I guessed innocently. Jacob, though big in looks, still seemed young; he couldn't be any older than 20, and I knew that the opposite sex could be cause for much pain for most young adults. Having never found one to hold my interest, I found that sort of pain to be a foreign one. Even still, I'd helped talk things out with many of my love-stricken friends.

"She ah… meant the world to me, and she was in a lot of pain. The guy she liked—no loved; hell even _obsessed_ over a little bit—left her high and dry. When she turned her attention toward me I was thrilled, I knew I could give her a happy life that he couldn't. Then, the asshole suddenly comes back in her life, and she all but flies back into his arm. Fucking idiot; hurt like shit. But you know? It doesn't really seem to hurt anymore."

He started to stare at me again; desperately trying to work something out in his head. I stared back at him all the while before he mumbled, "I need to go," and left in as quick of a fury as he entered in.

**Jacob**

It's not that I don't love Sam and Emily—Sam is my brother, and Emily is like my sister—but after everything Bella put me through, with the pain of her leaving me in an instant to go save Edward's pompous ass, I simply couldn't stand being there, night after night, watching the intense bond they shared with one another.

Bella…that stupid, stupid girl. Couldn't she see how I felt about her? She lit my world up brighter than the sun when she came to me, half dead and holding in more pain than anyone thought was even possible for such a tiny frame. I fixed her like I fixed those ratty-ass bikes. I watched as she started to show signs of _life_ again, started living like a real person, and all the while my boyish crush grew into a love so intense I asked Sam if she could be _it: _My imprint. But no, she was just some stupid, ignorant girl infatuated with a mother-fucking bloodsucker. Good. Let her play with the leaches.

Running helped me, but only so much. Though my body didn't physically hurt because I ran myself to the point of exhaustion, allowing the Wolf to roam free until he couldn't move any more, I still had my thoughts to torture me at night. The pack knew not to say anything. They were holding back, and all the while I thought it was because they knew I was hurting, but after two days, I started to tell there was something else going on that they weren't telling me. So finally, after three days of Sam and Emily rubbing their pretty little love in my face, I demanded to go home. I needed to sleep in my own bed, I said, but really. I wanted to know what was going on over there that they thought I couldn't handle knowing. I may be fucked up from Bella's him-haw ways, but I'm big enough to handle whatever was waiting for me in my own house.

Or so I thought. I stormed into the house, shouting, looking for Billy, and then I see her. She's gorgeous. Lighter skin, raven-dark hair, and bright blue eyes. Sitting in my bed, looking like she's just seen the ghost of Christmas past. Instantly, I knew this was it; I felt every fiber in my body being pulled toward her, I wanted to comfort her and ask her what was wrong, I wanted to spend my whole life protecting her from whatever was scaring her so badly. I was blind until I saw her face. And so astonished, knowing that it wasn't supposed to happen like this, I said the first thing I wanted to know: "Who the hell are you?"

Jewel, she says. Yeah, she is a jewel, a gem in my life I don't want to get rid of. But I can't say anything. All I can do is look at her beautiful face, and wonder why now, why her? I was still hurting—Bella had slashed a hole into my heart—and now here I am, willing to set it all aside for this girl I don't even know, who's apparently in my bed, and can't even remember getting there. To warn me of danger, she says, and I hold the scoff I thought of, as if she could protect me from danger, when she obviously needs to be protected. I continue to stare at her and wonder if this was really the right time to find my one and only soul mate, I wasn't sure, it was all too much.

And I felt so bad. I wanted to be there and help her make sense of the world she unknowingly thrust herself into, but I needed to make sense of my own world that she unknowingly thrust me into. So, while she tried to make small talk with me—I need to go, I thought, maybe even mumbled, and then I left her, and headed right back to Sam's.

I looked at my Rabbit, which sat untouched since the fateful night at the movies with Bella, and decided it would be better to run. I didn't even bother to let the Wolf consume me, but instead began to sprint in human form to my alpha's house. "Jake," he invited me in once he saw the disheveled look that was most likely plastered onto my face, "What's up?"

"Did you know this would happen if I went home? Did Billy know?"

"Know what, man, calm down."

"I think it happened; I found my imprint."


	3. Chapter 3

Three

Emily sat next to Sam, holding his hands, staring at me, trying to look serious but her joyous smile broke through every few minutes. I can see why'd she be happy for me, but it wasn't the time to sit there with a dumb grin. I was confused, and I needed answers.

"Well," Sam said once I told him what happened, how I felt and all that stuff, "It sounds like you've found your other half, Jake."

"But what do I do now? Nobody even knows why she came here—_she _doesn'teven know why she left. And I seriously think Billy knows something about all of this."

Emily offered her advice, saying, "Why don't you talk to him, Jake? Billy is usually wise about all of this stuff."

"Yeah man," Sam agreed, "There's not much we can do for you on this one. You know how imprinting is; you've seen how we think. The bond is something you have to figure out on your own, it's whatever works best for you and your mate. If you wanna keep this under wraps for a bit, keep the pack out of it until you have some of this sorted out, we can take you off patrols for a week. It's been dead around here anyway."

I stood up, deciding it was time to go home and talk to Billy. "Thanks, Sam," I said as I walked out the door. This time, I took a slow walk back to my house, thinking about what Sam had said. _You know how imprinting is; you've seen how we think._ Yeah, it's all you can think about for the first few months. You think about their safety, if they're okay, what they're doing right now, what you'd be doing if you could be with them…Some of that stuff is downright mind-porn. I thought about Jewel then, and if I could think about her like that. I thought about her tan skin…I bet she has soft skin, perfect for nipping sensually…There was no doubt she was beautiful. She seemed like a person that could really dominate, hold her own. Whereas Bella was someone to take care of, Jewel looked like someone who would demand to be equal with me. Jewel was hard where Bella was soft; she had curves where Bella was stick-thin. Yeah, I could definitely think of Jewel as my lover, and that was scary, seeing as I'd only met the girl an hour or ago.

Feeling calmer than when I left, but still fairly unsettled, I walked up the porch steps and into the kitchen. Billy sat at the table, arms folded, waiting for me. "Jewel said she met you, and you seemed quite frazzled when you came in and when you left," he said nonchalantly.

"Did you know, Dad," I asked, exasperated, as I sat down.

"That you'd imprint on her? I had a hunch. I wanted to keep you two apart from one another until I could explain, either to you or to her, what her place is here on the reservation."

"What do you mean? Is she Quileute? She looked like she could have some native in her, but not that much."

"Jake, have you ever heard of spirit women?"

"Yeah, they interpret dreams, right?"

"They do much more than that. Their dreams tell us of things to come. A spirit lady used to warn the spirit warriors of dangers in the spirit realm, and later they told us of big attacks by the cold ones. It's a very important position, one a woman is usually born into. Our last spirit lady was born about seventy years ago. You see, you can tell when a spirit lady is born to the Quileutes because they are marked with a moon, and when Marlene Acoma was born, she had a crescent moon on her left shoulder. We told her of her gift when she was eighteen, and she left. Marlene wanted a bigger life, and no one heard from her after she departed all those years ago.

"Jewel got her three days ago when you were running patrol. She said, 'Please, danger comes,' and then collapsed from exhaustion. I had Sue come over and take care of her; she had a fever and needed to be cleaned. After she washed the girl up, I noticed the mark on her left should blade. It looked just like Marlene's. I called Sam and asked him to keep you busy for a bit while I figured out if she was really who I thought she was. Though she doesn't remember it, she told me everything I needed to know. She said the spirit warrior sent her. They told Marlene, who told her in a dream, that our people were going to be in grave danger."

"I kept you away, son, because I knew you were hurting. Bella is a sweet girl—don't give me that look, she may not know that what she did is both dangerous and hurtful to you, but she's still a nice girl," Billy intervened as he saw my glare at her name, "You were clearly still healing from her decision, and I just wanted to give you a bit more time to yourself. You see traditionally, the tribal leader is bonded with the spirit lady. I had never been sure if imprinting was a part of that bond, but I didn't want to put you through the chance at the moment. It would merely complicate your life even more."

So that was it. Even though Sam had the title of pack leader, the position was rightly mine, seeing as I'm a descendant of Ephraim Black. When I phased for the first time, it was so much to take in. I had a huge responsibility, taking care of our tribe, and protecting all of Forks from any and all bloodsuckers that made their way into our home. I couldn't handle being the leader of the pack on top of all that. And as Sam was the first to change, he had a better handle on alpha duties than ever could. I let him keep his alpha position, not wanting the extra pressure, wanting to keep something the same.

Billy knew I was pretty torn up, and he wanted to keep me out of some added stress for once. But now here I am with my soul mate, and if she really is a spirit lady, as Billy seems to think she is, then I have to manage finding the right place for Jewel in my life as well as tell the pack about whatever danger it is that she sees. That's my life, calm as a fucking lazy lagoon. But I needed to get myself together. I had to. I have people to protect; I have my other half to think about.

"Now what," I asked for the tenth time, "What do I do now?"

"Well we need to let Jewel adjust to being awake, give her some time to see what she knows, then we'll talk to her. You can sleep on the couch if you want to sleep here; it only seems fair to give the girl your room."

"Sam says I have a week off from patrol duty."

"That's nice," Billy mused, rolling off to do who knows what, "You can use that time to get to know Jewel, see how you two bond."


End file.
